Former students at an elite New York City prep school where Jeffery Epstein taught in the 1970s recall the now-convicted sex offender giving persistent attention to teenage girls and recall red flags in his behavior, according to accounts given to The New York Times and HuffPost.

He was hired to teach math and science by the father of Attorney General William Barr, when he was in his early 20s with no college degree. Epstein was pictured in Dalton yearbooks in 1975 and 1976, according to Yahoo Finance.

Former students recalled Epstein wearing a fur coat and a gold chain and being someone who was an unusual figure at the school.

No female students who spoke to the Times or HuffPost recalled Epstein making unwanted physical contact with him, but many students remembered him speaking to female students in the hallways.

"I can remember thinking at the time, 'This is wrong,'" Scott Spizer, a class of 1976 Dalton alumnus, told The Times.

Some students remember him being a caring teacher, but others recall him being a little too laid back.

"I didn't learn a whole lot. He didn't take the classes very seriously," Dr. Susan Cohn, class of 1975, told HuffPost, adding that she thought he was "a bit smarmy."

Officials at Dalton have not reposted to INSIDER's request for comment.

Federal prosecutors on Monday charged Epstein with sex trafficking. In the indictment, federal prosecutors allege that Epstein molested girls as young as 14 in a sex-trafficking operation that ran from at least 2002 to 2005, with dozens of girls victimized. He has pleaded not guilty.